Georges Didi-Huberman (France, 1953) is one of the most distinguished contemporary thinkers in philosophy and the theory and history of images. He is the author of more than sixty books and, for his extensive career, was recognized with the Medalla de Oro del Círculo de Bellas Artes in 2018.

Didi-Huberman's workplace is not a "studio" as such. It is, rather, a workshopA vast space designed almost entirely by and for the activity of inventing thought in its many forms. But the philosopher Didi-Huberman's workshop is not merely a physical, locatable place. Above all, it is his own personal space that accompanies him wherever he goes, a place for experimentation. So, what constitutes the "work" of a philosopher? Does his "work" consist solely of his texts? No. His work also includes the archival techniques of his library, experimental films, lectures that challenge academic standards, magical moments of reading, ambitious exhibition projects, numerous collaborations with artists, and a long list of other practical ways of questioning, creating, and disseminating thought.

Thus, the exhibition In the philosopher's workshop. Georges Didi-Huberman It presents an expanded view of this thinker's philosophical legacy through a selection of audiovisual pieces from that lesser-known part of his work. This exhibition brings together for the first time the audiovisual works created individually by Georges Didi-Huberman (L'Optogramme1983; Face to face to matter, 1997), as well as several experimental projects prepared in collaboration with various artists (Jean-André Fieschi, Israel Galván, the Artistes & Associés association, Alain Fleischer, Frederico Benevides). Furthermore, el Círculo de Bellas Artes He has commissioned the creation of two pieces specifically for this exhibition: on the one hand, the film From the table to the lid: compass (2023) by Henri Herré (France), which shows Didi-Huberman's work process (in this case, the assembly of annotated cards with which he structures the contents for a chapter of a future book) in light of another activity in which he uses his hands: playing the flamenco guitar; and, on the other hand, the site-specific installation Slide collection by the artist Arno Gisinger (Austria, 1964), a double projection created from the library of slide images by Georges Didi-Huberman, which is currently obsolete.

With this display of techniques, paths, and formats not so common in the development of thought, but which also form part of his output, this exhibition highlights a fundamental feature of Didi-Huberman's philosophical approach, both on a personal and theoretical level—also in light of how he has investigated certain topics and authors throughout his career—: constant inquiry and radical experimentation as methodological principles of his research. Because, as he himself maintains, "philosophical activity is a becoming: it transforms, it goes, it comes, and it begins again." Didi-Huberman has referred to this approach with the word "heuristic," a term that comes from the Greek. heuriskeinwhich means to search, investigate, discover. This attitude does not exclude any hypothesis or procedure in principle, but remains always open to experimentation and change.

Ultimately, the exhibition is an invitation to enter the workshop of the philosopher Georges Didi-Huberman, here and there, those places where he puts into practice, in a great variety of ways, the primordial gesture of inventing relationships and generating encounters not only between words, things and images, but also between people, formats, disciplines, institutions, times and divergent latitudes.

Image credits: Arno Gisinger, photograph from Georges Didi-Huberman slide archive, 2024